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Your ECs can involve community service, but they don’t have to. Community service is not privileged over other kinds of ECs. An EC is basically anything productive you do outside of school, other than really passive things like reading. It doesn’t really matter what you do specifically, because the goal is just to show focus, dedication, accomplishment, and leadership in whatever you do.
What will the multivariable people take next year?
I went to a small rural high school, so I tested out of classes so I could take dual-enrollment classes full time in my senior year. I don’t regret it, because it was a wonderful experience and it essentially means I’m getting to go to college for five years instead of four (and the first year was free, because I live in a state that pays for dual enrollment). In my case I think the intellectual benefits outweighed the harms, but testing out of things is not an ideal way to learn if you have other options. Self-study is the blind leading the blind, and there are some weird gaps in my knowledge that could have been avoided if I hadn’t skipped classes. </p>
<p>There’s no reason you should have to skip classes in order to take the most rigorous courses your school offers **by the end of your senior year<a href=“taking%20multivariable%20as%20a%20freshman%20is%20useless%20if%20you’re%20not%20going%20to%20advance%20beyond%20that%20until%20college”>/b</a>, unless you were behind when you came in. You should only skip classes if it will give you the opportunity to take more advanced classes in high school than you would have been able to take otherwise maybe through dual enrollment or something, but colleges can’t really give you extra “points” for doing things like this because most people don’t have the opportunity to do these things. Taking the best courses your school offers is enough for college admissions, so if you want to study topics outside of what your high school offers it should be for your own intellectual benefit.</p>